Speaker Sessions: The Importance of a Focus on Quality, QA and Testing

Calling all tech founders, technologists, and aspiring leaders!

Join Oxford Leaders in Tech (OxLiT) for an evening dedicated to the often-underestimated, but critical, field of Quality Assurance (QA) and Testing in today's AI-powered world.

We'll be hosting three speaker sessions led by industry experts:

• Barney Quinn will delve into the ever-increasing importance of QA and Testing in a landscape driven by Artificial Intelligence.
• Paul Mowat will explore pragmatic approaches to QA, emphasizing the essential soft skills needed to navigate this dynamic field.
• Peter Schrammel will explore the question how we actually know whether the code written by an AI tool is fit for purpose.

About Barney: Barney has over 30 years’ board experience with technology companies. He was a main board director of Sherwood International plc, a provider of software and services to the insurance industry for many years.

He was also CEO of Workplace Systems International plc an early provider of cloud-based workforce management solutions which was AIM listed and which he then took private. These major technology companies had great success in North America and internationally and resulted in significant exits. After finishing full time roles Barney has had a plural career with both public and private technology companies. Today he is Chairman of Arkivum in the digital preservation space and an Advisor to Insoft the development and testing company.

Paul Mowat, Director of Infinity Tech Consulting with two decades in global Consultancies. Paul’s background is in IT delivery and IT leadership across multiple industries, Financial Services and Insurance, Telco and Media, Retail, Utilities and Logistic, Government and Pharmaceutical and Tobacco. Paul provides advice on business transformation and Quality Assurance. Driving return on investment using efficiency improvements like test assessments, innovation initiatives including test automation and continuous improvement efforts.

Paul's talk will cover how testers can embrace pragmatic approaches by being adaptable and staying aligned with the ever-evolving QA role. Paul will cover the soft skills, and discuss where the testing demand is and how to look out for the needed skills.

About Peter: Peter is CTO and co-founder of Diffblue, a company based in Oxford. Prior to Diffblue, Peter worked as a lecturer and researcher in software analysis and testing, co-developing several software verification tools. At Diffblue he drives forward technology and product architecture of Diffblue's AI for Code technologies with the goal to make software developers happier and more productive.

This event is organised by Humand Talent and supported by the Business and IP Centre Oxfordshire.